It is still a bit difficult to know what to make of Battle, as he
essentially enters his post-“Ultimate Fighter” era in this spot.
Battle won the 2021 middleweight bracket and was an interesting but
still clearly raw prospect. He is definitely a natural scrapper
willing to throw out volume, but a lot of his fights relied on his
absorbing his opponents’ offense before taking over and outlasting
them in the end. That was the story in Battle’s season-winning
performance against Gilbert
Urbina and to a lesser extent his three-round outpacing of
castmate Tresean
Gore, but it is still hard to tell exactly how far he can take
that approach before digging himself too deep of a hole to get out
of. To his credit, Battle has been improving along the way,
particularly getting into much better shape once he was able to
focus on mixed martial arts full-time. As part of that, he cuts
down to welterweight for the first time to take on Sato. Japan’s
Sato is a frustrating fighter, as he is an obvious talent who
offers much-too-low output to maximize his physical gifts. When
Sato actually throws a counter, he has shown some stunning accuracy
and power, but against all but the most fragile UFC welterweights,
he has mostly just ended up coasting to a loss. Things could line
up perfectly for Sato here. Battle provides a lot of defensive
openings, and it remains unclear how well his chin holds up with a
larger weight cut or against a hard hitter. However, the likelier
bet is that Battle can just swamp Sato in volume on the feet and
find some success with his wrestling over three rounds. The pick is
Battle via decision.
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